Her Chinese Mother

I have been doing more than a healthy share of thinking since Evelyn and I had "Emotions and Revelations Near the Produce" night.

The topics in my mind have ranged far and wide. I have thought mostly about Bean's reaction, or lack there-of for the Chinese Mother that we saw.
I know that she is just a kid and she doesn't really have a concept of how things work but, she knows not to take toys form other people. I wonder why she thought that it was okay to take that mother's child? Maybe it was because she wanted a sister so badly that she damned the torpedoes. Maybe I am reading WAY too much into this.
I am afraid though that maybe I have to start talking about her Chinese Mother? Somehow it doesn't feel quite right yet. I have talked before about how we backed off on initiating any adoption talk with Ev. I feel that this was the right thing to do for her. She had some issues that were lingering and those have been resolved as soon as we stopped initiating things ourselves. She asks about China quite alot. I am always ready to tell a story or show her a picture. She has just never asked about her Chinese Mother or Father. She knows that babies grow in bellies of their mama's. She knows that she was in an orphanage. She has yet to connect some dots. I am dreading the day that she does.
I know the things that I am planning on telling her when she asks. I know that I will try to explain that her Chinese Mother did love her, how could she not have? I will never know the circumstances that led to Evelyn being left at the gate of that orphanage. I can guess though. I can guess that for whatever reason that woman had no choice.
NO CHOICE. That is a difficult thing for Americans to understand. Having been to China and seen some of the things that I have seen, I get it. There are places and times in this world where people can not , are not allowed to, live how they see fit. There are places where Mother's have no choice to raise their children. Their choice becomes life versus death for these tiny precious babies. When they choose life, they are choosing the hard road. They are risking loosing everything they have and going to prison. They are putting their daughters ahead of themselves. That's about the best scenario that I have. Her Chinese mother had no choice but to choose to abandon her. This must have been done out of love. Who could look at a tiny, beautiful baby and not feel love? I know that this is what I must tell Evelyn. Because to take any other route would mean that one day I have to say to her, I just don't know- I have no guesses, you were not loved. I find that I can't even hardly type those words, how could I ever say them?
I think that I must have to think that way for myself as well. It is hard enough to think about Evelyn on those first days of her life, so tiny and left behind and then think that there was no love for her. I have to leave space in my heart for compassion towards this woman who made a choice that is to me, unfathomable. Because if I don't? Evelyn will know. One day, she will know, she will sense it when we speak. I must believe these things so that one day, she can believe these things. That there was love. That there was something. I will never KNOW.
But, I can guess. And I can hope that I am in some way, right.
I have been looking over the paperwork that we received while in China. One piece of that paperwork is what is called the Certificate of Abandonment. You see, this piece of paper is very important because children who are viable for international adoption must have no ties to any person in China. That means that the separation from her birth family is real and permanent and irreversible. That means that one day when she can read, she will see the line "Yi Fu Mei is an abandoned baby definitely". I have to be ready in my heart to help her read that sentence and take it in, that's my job. I am her Mother. I can't NOT allow her to see these things because she might get hurt. They are a part of who we are. It's all a part of how we are a family. I can not imagine keeping secrets from her.
I wish that I could. But I know, in the end, she will need to know so she can work through things and find herself. She will need to realize that there was love because if there was no love, then she has nothing to build on.